Key to building strong resilience to climate change is building stronger economies: PM Dr Skerrit

Dominica: Prime Minister of Commonwealth of Dominica addressed the IMF Annual Meeting with the Caribbean. The agenda of the meeting remained "Navigation the crisis towards thriving Caribbean economies".

Prime Minister Dr Roosevelt Skerrit stated that the countries that lie between the tropics of cancer and Capricorn bear the brunt of warmer seas, fiercer storms and rising sea levels and all the Caribbean nations lie within that belt.

Dr Skerrit stated that as Dominica is preparing to be climate-resilient, every nation in the region needs to prepare itself to fight the natural catastrophes that impact the region every now and then.

"The fundamental key to building strong resilience to climate change is actually building stronger economies – period. There is no mission that will protect the environment that does not speak to protecting our economy." added the leader.

Furthermore, he stated that it is a different period of challenge and also a unique period of opportunity, which gives combined weight to the value of multilateralism.

He stated that the international community must throw their collective weight and resources behind our efforts by creating a Growth and Resilience Fund that can present easy access to allow financing for resilient projects that will pay for itself by reducing vulnerability, loss and damage.

Besides this, he added that adopting the vulnerability index as the measure for determining grant and concessional financing to SIDS should be designed with the involvement of best expertise and should not be a unilateral imposition as previous methods.

He also emphasised that it is significant to provide additional grant financing to support COVID 19 management, vaccines, social programs and supporting micro, small and medium-sized firms and additional concessional financing for budget support and relaxing fiscal rules in an appropriate, limited and temporary way to get us through this period of crisis.

As per the leader more flexible obligations, for the debt contracted to respond to shocks; and an extension of the Debt Service Suspension Initiative (DSSI) by the Paris Club for 6-12 months shall be performed.

"As small island economies like ours, with a shallow private sector and limited safety nets, Government’s expenditure is critical to sustaining lives, livelihoods and the economy. If our Governments are not in a position to spend, the recovery will be more prolonged and painful for our people," added Dr Roosevelt Skerrit.